Recovery of DC jet wreckage begins as investigators review new information

Near the majestic National Monument in Washington, D.C., a towering crane hovers over the Potomac River. Its massive shadow looms over the ongoing investigation to determine the cause of the mid-air collision between a passenger plane and a military helicopter last Wednesday. A new phase of salvage operations began on Monday (Tuesday in Eastern Australia), in what is the deadliest U.S. aviation disaster in more than 20 years.

On Monday, an aircraft engine became the first piece of wreckage to be recovered from the frigid river, slowly lifted by the crane. Video footage from the shore showed salvage crews carefully guiding it onto the deck of a barge. From a distance, most of the engine's cowling and exhaust nozzle appeared intact. Here is the latest on the salvage operation and the investigation into the cause of the accident.

Underwater recovery efforts began after divers completed a thorough survey of the underwater debris field over the weekend. They developed a plan to recover the aircraft wreckage, which is expected to take a week. The recovery of the helicopter wreckage is expected to take an additional four days. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which is managing the salvage operation, said that the exact timeline is uncertain as not all of the victims have been identified. If more human remains are found during the wreckage cleanup, they will pause work. “The solemn search for the missing passengers and crew is the priority,” Col. Francis Pella, the Corps’ Baltimore district commander, said Sunday. A Sunday news conference said that 55 of the 67 victims had been identified. This includes 28 athletes, coaches and family members associated with U.S. Figure Skating. The organization said many of them had attended the national championships in Wichita and a subsequent training camp.

The salvage team began work under clear skies, but they will be operating in water with temperatures of only about 36 degrees Fahrenheit. Washington is expected to see inclement weather again by Wednesday, with the possibility of sleet. Over the weekend, there were indications that the pilot of one of the aircraft may have seen the other plane before the collision: The National Transportation Safety Board said that the aircraft’s flight data recorder showed that the plane’s nose was slightly raised before the disaster. “There was a slight change in pitch, an increase, very close to the point of impact,” NTSB member Todd Inman said at a Saturday evening news briefing.

A key question in the investigation is whether the Black Hawk helicopter was above its required 200-foot altitude limit while flying its planned route along the east bank of the Potomac River. Inman said that the Bombardier jet’s flight data recorder showed it was at about 325 feet at the time of the impact, but air traffic controllers never showed the helicopter’s altitude as exceeding 200 feet. The NTSB said Sunday that they had located the Black Hawk’s black box. The board’s chair, Jennifer Homendy, told Fox News on Monday that information had been recovered from the flight data recorder. “We do have that data,” Homendy said, “and we’ll be providing that in a news conference later today.” Homendy said the black box is critical because the Washington, D.C., tower radar does not continuously read aircraft altitude, but only updates it every five seconds. “What we’re doing is extracting additional data to get better, more granular information to understand the altitude,” she said. “The question is going to be, is that reading from the helicopter? Or is it a misread from the tower equipment?” said Mary Schiavo, a former inspector general for the Department of Transportation and a CNN transportation analyst. If the radar shows an incorrect reading, Schiavo said investigators will want to look at maintenance records. “Air traffic controllers don’t fix the tower equipment,” Schiavo told CNN’s John Berman, “that’s done by contractors, so now we’re looking at another group of people. Who was fixing the tower equipment?” The NTSB’s preliminary report may take up to a month to be released.

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy told CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday that the helicopter’s altitude remains a key question that needs to be answered, but there are other questions as well. “Were the pilots of the Black Hawk wearing night vision goggles? Did it impact their peripheral vision or perception?” he said. “What was going on inside (air traffic control) tower?” Duffy added. “Were they understaffed?” On the night of the accident, one controller was handling approach traffic for both the plane and the helicopter, an air traffic control source told CNN. Typically, those jobs are handled by two people separately, though the source and the air traffic controllers union said it’s not uncommon for those duties to be combined. While the work of gathering evidence from recordings and recovering wreckage from the water continues, a former director of the FAA’s Office of Accident Investigation said he is confident that the cause of the disaster will be clear. “We have radar data, we have witnesses, we have all the wreckage,” Steven Wallace told CNN’s Phil Mattingly. “There is nothing missing.”